


After

by Leahelisabeth (fortheloveofcamelot)



Series: Twinyards Appreciation Week [1]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Aaron needs help with feelings, Drake mention, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Manslaughter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-29
Updated: 2017-10-29
Packaged: 2019-01-25 23:59:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12544220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fortheloveofcamelot/pseuds/Leahelisabeth
Summary: Created for twinyardsappreciationweek on Tumblr. Day 1: Found Family.Aaron Minyard is a killer now. He finds comfort from an unusual source.





	After

Day 1--Found Family

When it’s all over, when the blood is washed away, and Andrew is on his way to get clean for good, Aaron is lost. He’s no stranger to negative emotion, external or internal, and he expects to be drowned in it. There is some of course. He’s angry, at his uncle for letting a monster into his home, at Neil for talking them into visiting in the first place, but mostly at Andrew for his lack of self preservation. How many times has he seen Andrew pull those knives on someone twice his size simply for breathing funny? Even stronger than anger is the guilt. Not really for killing Drake, although he feels sick to his stomach when he knows that his hands have been used to take life when he was hoping they would learn to preserve it. No, Aaron feels a fierce type of joy every time he imagines that fucker’s gray matter splattered on the wall and the bed where he’d been...been. No, he feels no remorse for murdering Drake. But because now he knows everything, why Andrew pushed him away when he first reached out, and the kind of monsters that Andrew sees in his nightmares, and why Andrew murdered their mother. 

Aaron is wallowing. He knows it. Katelyn has been sweet, doing her best to make him feel better, offering him massages and kisses when he feels like the blood on his hands will stain her. She’s so pure and she’s always seen the best in him. He wonders what he would have to do for her to see the truth, how much longer she’ll be able to ignore the rot in his center. Which is why he tells her not to come over and then hits ignore on all her texts. Nicky will barely leave him alone, hovering like a worried butterfly in the background of every moment. So he locks himself in his room and ignores everyone and everything. He thinks he might let Neil in if he showed up as the only person so far to actually tell him what a shithead he’s been.

A gentle knock comes at the door. Aaron ignores it.

“Aaron? It’s me,” a soft voice calls. “It’s Renee.”

Aaron almost ignores her. She’s so nice and he doesn’t deserve it. But then he thinks of how close she and Andrew have always been and how protective she is of people she cares about and the core of steel he sees on the court. He remembers the bruised knuckles and split lips that are likely the closest thing to tenderness that his brother knows. And he decides that if Renee is here to mark up his skin like she has his brother’s, it’s no less than he deserves.

She doesn’t. She comes in with a plate of cinnamon buns, fresh from the oven. Aaron doesn’t have a sweet tooth like Andrew but Renee knows that this is the one thing that both Minyard twins cannot resist.

Aaron plans to say no but before the word gets out of his mouth, it’s being stuffed with delicious bread and cinnamon. He expects it to turn to ashes in his mouth but it’s so good he cries.

And Renee looks at him like she knows he isn’t crying over cinnamon buns but she says nothing and just sits beside him on the bed without touching him. She stays, a solid warm presence beside him, until he cries himself out.

Finally, he sits up again and faces her. She holds out the plate of cinnamon buns again and he takes another. It tastes even better now that he feels lighter.

After he swallows the last bite, Renee reaches out and holds his trembling hands in her own rock-steady ones.

“Thank you,” she says.

And Aaron feels like he should hate it, receiving gratitude for an act of such violence, but instead he feels understood.

“I should have done it sooner,” he says earnestly. “I let him protect me and...resented him for it, and I never thought that he might need protection too.”

“But you stepped up the moment you knew," Renee says. “And I suspected that something like this must be in his past but I had no idea about any of the details." Renee's voice hardens. “You did what I would have done." 

Aaron knows about Renee's sordid past but he hasn't really believed it until right this moment. He grips her hand back tight, another person in their tiny world who would kill for Andrew Minyard.


End file.
